Career choice among physiotherapy students at Mangalore, India

Context: Understanding the factors which influence the career preferences is of importance to policy makers, health care educationist and other stake holders. So, it would be interesting to know what makes the students join Physiotherapy course and their future plans. Objectives: The aim of the present study was to explore the career choices and the intentions of a cohort of undergraduate students of physiotherapy in Mangalore, India. ethods: An anonymous, self-administered, questionnairebased survey was carried out among the consenting undergraduate students of physiotherapy. Results and Conclusion: The final response rate was 98% (79/81). The mean age of the students was 22 years (SD 3,range 18-25years). Forty-five students (57%) were females and 34 students (43%) were males. The participants were more influenced in the career choices by their own passion for the allied health sciences, followed by being inspired by a family member. A majority of the students wanted to pursue further specialization in physiotherapy in the form of post-graduation studies. A majority of the students expressed great satisfaction with career choice and had less intention of changing their profession. A majority of the students opted to work in India rather than to migrate abroad after the completion of their studies (p= 0.0027). Future work in multi-specialty hospitals and private-practice was highly preferred by a majority of students as compared to academic career (p=0.011).